Biometric gallery management using wireless identifiers

ABSTRACT

Biometric gallery management is performed by association one or more wireless identifiers that correspond to one or more mobile devices (such as smart phones, tablet computing devices, cellular telephones, wearable devices, smart watches, fitness monitors, digital media players, medical devices, and/or other mobile computing devices) that people carry with digital representations of biometrics corresponding to the people. Wireless identifiers corresponding to mobile devices proximate to a biometric reader device may be monitored. Upon detection of wireless identifiers corresponding to mobile devices proximate to the biometric reader device, the associated digital representations of biometrics may be loaded from a main gallery into one or more local galleries, which may then be used to perform one or more biometric identifications and/or verifications.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION(S)

This application is a continuation patent application of U.S. patentapplication Ser. No. 17/399,495, filed Aug. 11, 2021 and titled“Biometric Gallery Management Using Wireless Identifiers,” thedisclosure of which is hereby incorporated herein by reference in itsentirety.

FIELD

The described embodiments relate generally to biometric gallerymanagement. More particularly, the present embodiments relate tobiometric gallery management using wireless identifiers.

BACKGROUND

Biometric identification systems may identify people using biometrics.Biometrics may include fingerprints, palm prints, irises, eyes, faces,voices, gaits, pictures, or other identifying characteristics about aperson. A biometric identification system may capture information abouta biometric using a biometric reader and identify a person by comparingthe captured information against stored information. For example, animage sensor may capture an image of a fingerprint and compare the imageof the fingerprint against stored fingerprint images.

SUMMARY

The present disclosure relates to biometric gallery management usingwireless identifiers. One or more wireless identifiers that correspondto one or more mobile devices (such as smart phones, tablet computingdevices, cellular telephones, wearable devices, smart watches, fitnessmonitors, digital media players, medical devices, and/or other mobilecomputing devices) that people carry may be associated with digitalrepresentations of biometrics corresponding to the people. Wirelessidentifiers corresponding to mobile devices proximate to a biometricreader device may be monitored. Upon detection of wireless identifierscorresponding to mobile devices proximate to the biometric readerdevice, the associated digital representations of biometrics may beloaded from a main gallery into one or more local galleries, which maythen be used to perform one or more biometric identifications and/orverifications. Associations between digital representations ofbiometrics and one or more wireless identifiers may be determined,stored, and/or updated using digital representations of biometrics fromone or more identifications and/or verifications and wirelessidentifiers corresponding to one or more mobile devices detectedproximate to one or more biometric reader devices.

In various embodiments, a system for biometric gallery management usingwireless identifiers includes a server and a station. The server isoperable to receive a wireless identifier at a first time, receive adigital representation of a first biometric, and store an associationbetween the wireless identifier and the digital representation of thefirst biometric in a storage medium. The station is operable to receivethe wireless identifier at a second time, communicate the wirelessidentifier to the server, load the digital representation of the firstbiometric into a local gallery based on a response from the server, andperform a biometric identification by comparing a digital representationof a second biometric to the digital representation of the firstbiometric stored in the local gallery.

In some examples, the server is further operable to anonymize thewireless identifier in the association by hashing the wirelessidentifier. In a number of examples, the server is further operable toreceive a request to remove the wireless identifier and remove theassociation and the wireless identifier from the storage medium inresponse to the request. In various examples, the server is furtheroperable to receive a request to remove the association and remove theassociation from the storage medium in response to the request.

In a number of examples, the server is further operable to determinethat the wireless identifier is included in multiple associations andremove at least one of the multiple associations from the storagemedium. In some examples, the server is further operable to determinethat the wireless identifier is unassociated with a threshold number ofsubsequent identifications or is not subsequently received within athreshold amount of time and, in response to determining that thewireless identifier is unassociated with the threshold number ofsubsequent identifications or is not subsequently received within athreshold amount of time, remove the association from the storagemedium. In various examples, the server is further operable to receive anotification related to information in an app or application executingon an electronic device related to an activity performed by a person andinstruct the station to load a digital representation of a thirdbiometric associated with the person into the local gallery in responseto the notification.

In some embodiments, a system for biometric gallery management usingwireless identifiers includes a communication unit operable to receive awireless identifier, a biometric reader device operable to generate adigital representation of a biometric, a non-transitory storage mediumthat stores instructions, and a processor. The processor is operable toexecute the instructions to receive at least one stored digitalrepresentation of a biometric to load into a local gallery from a serverin response to communicating the wireless identifier and perform abiometric identification by comparing the digital representation of thebiometric to the at least one stored digital representation of thebiometric in the local gallery.

In various examples, the wireless identifier is a first wirelessidentifier, the digital representation of the biometric is a digitalrepresentation of a first biometric, and the processor is furtheroperable to receive a second wireless identifier, receive a digitalrepresentation of a second biometric, and request that the serverassociate the second wireless identifier with the digital representationof the second biometric. In some implementations of such examples, theprocessor requests that the server associate the second wirelessidentifier with the digital representation of the second biometric whenthe digital representation of the second biometric is received within athreshold amount of time of when the second wireless identifier isreceived. In a number of implementations of such examples, the processorcommunicates with a mobile device via the communication unit using thesecond wireless identifier. In various implementations of such examples,the processor receives a confirmation from the mobile device toassociate the second wireless identifier with the digital representationof the second biometric.

In some examples, the processor is further operable to transmit thedigital representation of the biometric to the server if the biometricidentification using the local gallery fails.

In a number of embodiments, a system for biometric gallery managementusing wireless identifiers includes a memory allocation configured tostore at least one executable asset and a processor allocationconfigured to access the memory allocation and execute the at least oneexecutable asset to instantiate a gallery management service and abiometric identification service. The gallery management service isoperable to receive a wireless identifier at a first time, receive adigital representation of a first biometric, store an associationbetween the wireless identifier and the digital representation of thefirst biometric in a storage medium, and load the digital representationof the first biometric into a gallery in response to receiving thewireless identifier at a second time. The biometric identificationservice is operable to perform a biometric identification by comparing adigital representation of a second biometric to the digitalrepresentation of the first biometric stored in the gallery.

In various examples, the gallery management service receives thewireless identifier from an associated application executing on a mobiledevice associated with the wireless identifier. In some examples, thesystem further includes a wireless beacon and the gallery managementservice receives the wireless identifier from a mobile device after themobile device receives a signal from the wireless beacon. In a number ofexamples, the gallery management service is further operable todetermine that the wireless identifier is associated with multipleidentities and disassociate the wireless identifier from an identity ofthe multiple identities that has the fewest associations with thewireless identifier. In various examples, the wireless identifier is afirst wireless identifier, the digital representation of the biometricis a digital representation of a first biometric, and the gallerymanagement service is further operable to receive a second wirelessidentifier, receive information specifying an identity that isassociated with a digital representation of a second biometric, andassociate the second wireless identifier with the digital representationof the second biometric. In some implementations of such examples, thegallery management service receives the second wireless identifier andthe information from a mobile device associated with the second wirelessidentifier.

In a number of examples, the wireless identifier is a first wirelessidentifier and the gallery management service is further operable todetermine that the wireless identifier is not subsequently received andthat a second wireless identifier is associated with the digitalrepresentation of the biometric and remove the association.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The disclosure will be readily understood by the following detaileddescription in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, wherein likereference numerals designate like structural elements.

FIG. 1 depicts a first example system for biometric gallery managementusing wireless identifiers.

FIG. 2 depicts a system of example relationships between examplecomponents that may be used to implement the first example system ofFIG. 1 .

FIG. 3 depicts a first example method for biometric gallery managementusing wireless identifiers. This first example method may be performedby the systems of FIGS. 1, 2, 8 , and/or 9.

FIG. 4 depicts a second example method for biometric gallery managementusing wireless identifiers. This second example method may be performedby the systems of FIGS. 1, 2, 8 , and/or 9.

FIG. 5 depicts a third example method for biometric gallery managementusing wireless identifiers. This third example method may be performedby the systems of FIGS. 1, 2, 8 , and/or 9.

FIG. 6 depicts a fourth example method for biometric gallery managementusing wireless identifiers. This fourth example method may be performedby the systems of FIGS. 1, 2, 8 , and/or 9.

FIG. 7 depicts a fifth example method for biometric gallery managementusing wireless identifiers. This fifth example method may be performedby the systems of FIGS. 1, 2, 8 , and/or 9.

FIG. 8 depicts a second example system for biometric gallery managementusing wireless identifiers.

FIG. 9 depicts a third example system for biometric gallery managementusing wireless identifiers.

FIG. 10 depicts a sixth example method for biometric gallery managementusing wireless identifiers. This sixth example method may be performedby the systems of FIGS. 1, 2, 8 , and/or 9.

FIG. 11 depicts a seventh example method for biometric gallerymanagement using wireless identifiers. This seventh example method maybe performed by the systems of FIGS. 1, 2, 8 , and/or 9.

FIG. 12 depicts a fourth example system for biometric gallery managementusing wireless identifiers.

FIG. 13 depicts an eighth example method for biometric gallerymanagement using wireless identifiers. This eighth example method may beperformed by the system of FIG. 12 .

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Reference will now be made in detail to representative embodimentsillustrated in the accompanying drawings. It should be understood thatthe following descriptions are not intended to limit the embodiments toone preferred embodiment. To the contrary, it is intended to coveralternatives, modifications, and equivalents as can be included withinthe spirit and scope of the described embodiments as defined by theappended claims.

The description that follows includes sample systems, apparatuses,methods, and computer program products that embody various elements ofthe present disclosure. However, it should be understood that thedescribed disclosure may be practiced in a variety of forms in additionto those described herein.

Biometric galleries may be managed using wireless identifiers. In thecontext of the present application, a “wireless identifier” may be anaddress, name, or other structure that uniquely identifies an electronicdevice (such as a mobile device) or communication component thereof inwireless communication. Examples of wireless identifiers may include oneor more Bluetooth™ identifiers, Bluetooth™ Low Energy or LE identifiers,cellular identifiers, Wi-Fi identifiers, Ethernet identifiers,Near-field communication identifiers, media access control addressidentifiers, and so on. Use of wireless identifiers to manage biometricgalleries is discussed in detail below.

Embodiments discussed herein may generally apply to two types ofbiometric matching, namely “verification” matching and “identification”matching. Verification matches may be made to determine a person'sidentity from among a group of known people culled from a larger pool,while identification matches may be made to determine an individual'sidentity from the larger pool itself (e.g., rather than against a subsetof the pool, as in verification).

Verification may assume knowledge of the person presenting themselves,and may verify his or her identity using biometric matching. Thisprocess may use a small number of potential matches, as the verificationprocess itself may deeply narrow down the potential matching candidatesin advance. This is referred to as 1-to-1 or 1-to-few matching, where“few” may mean a relatively small pool of potential candidates to matchagainst, such as less than 20. Verification may be a useful biometricmatching solution when there is some knowledge introduced at the exacttime of the biometric match, like an identification card with a name orother personal identifier.

In these cases, a workflow may include a) presenting an identificationtoken with a personal identifier on it, b) reading the personalidentifier and querying a biometric repository to identify potentialmatches, c) performing a biometric match against the returned potentialmatches, and d) responding with a match result. One example of this typeof use may be when a person puts their ATM card in a bank machine, andthe bank ATM then takes a photo of their face and compares it to theregistered face associated with the accounts associated with thepresented ATM card. In that case, the facial recognition matching isonly comparing the photo to the faces associated with that account, notall faces for all accounts registered at that bank.

Identification may assume no advanced knowledge of who is presentingthemselves to be identified. This process may be referred to as1-to-many or 1-to-n. Identification operations may be much more complexthan verification operations, as they may rely on using the biometricsthemselves, and they may search against the entire gallery of enrolledindividuals, which may measure into the hundreds of millions ofidentities.

The process of doing 1-to-many identifications against a group ofbiometrically enrolled individuals may consist of the following steps:

1. Build a “gallery” of enrollment templates. A gallery may be a set ofbiometric templates for enrolled individuals. Each template may beassociated with an enrolled identity. A template may be a binary stringthat is produced by running an algorithm against a biometric image(e.g., fingerprint, iris, face, and so on).

2. Place the gallery in an infrastructure that has a matching algorithm.If the gallery size is large, this infrastructure may be very large, asmeasured by the number of servers or core processes that may run inparallel to handle large gallery size or concurrent identificationrequests.

3. As probe images are sent to the matching infrastructure, the matchingalgorithm may attempt to find an identity within some acceptablematching threshold. A probe image may be an image taken at the time anindividual is to be biometrically identified. It may be turned into aprobe template using the same or similar logic to create gallerytemplates, and that probe template may be introduced to the matchingalgorithm and may produce match results.

Challenges to overcome with biometric matching solutions may include 1)accuracy, 2) latency, and 3) throughput.

Accuracy may be determined by a measure of False Positive Rate (FPR) andFalse Negative Rate (FNR). A given matching algorithm may have definedrates of these measures, and they may be variable based on the number oftemplates in the gallery. As the gallery grows, it may be challenging tokeep the accuracy stable, perhaps even high.

Latency may mean the time it takes for a single identificationoperation, and throughput may mean how many identifications can be donewithin a given period of time. A given matching algorithm may beoptimized for (or may generally address) one or both of these measures.

Some biometrics, by their very nature, may be faster or more accuratethan others. Likewise, some biometrics may be slower or less accuratethan others. Entities that choose to implement biometric identificationmay take many factors into account as to which biometrics they want toconsider.

Some major factors to consider may include importance of accurateidentification, user experience, timeliness of response, and cost ofinfrastructure.

More mature and “high-touch” biometric matching solutions, likefingerprints and irises, may deliver high accuracy and speed withsmaller cost to infrastructure, but may deliver such results at theexpense of user experience. The biometrics may operate within awell-defined set of quality and acceptance criteria, and the biometriccapture devices may be specialized to capture only good images underideal sets of conditions.

Newer “low-touch” biometric matching solutions, like facial recognition,may deliver a very desirable user experience, but may deliver such atthe cost of accuracy, speed, and cost to infrastructure. The biggestchallenge with some of the “low-touch” biometric matching solutions maybe that they are impacted by many more external factors that may impactresults, lighting for facial recognition, for example. The combinationof both less mature matching algorithms as well as the high level ofdeviation of biometric images for the same identity because of externalconditions may lead to a significant impact in both accuracy and speedfor these “low-touch” biometrics. This accuracy drop-off may become veryrelevant as the size of the gallery grows. In some facial recognitionmatching algorithms, a gallery size of 50,000 may be where accuracybegins to degrade dramatically to the point of becoming useless. Thismay be extremely limiting when a desired gallery size of 100 million isdesired for an identification operation.

In order to improve accuracy, latency, and/or throughput, the presentdisclosure may generate one or more subset galleries or “localgalleries” from the gallery, which may be designated the “main gallery.”Such a local gallery may store a portion of the digital representationsof biometrics and/or other biometric information stored by the maingallery. As such, performing biometric matching against the localgallery may be more accurate, lower latency, and/or higher throughputthan matching against the main gallery. Biometric matching against thelocal gallery that is unsuccessful may failover into matching againstthe main gallery (and/or one or more local galleries where one or morelocal galleries are created, such as different subsets of the maingallery).

In the context of this disclosure, terms such as “biometricinformation,” “biometric data,” “information about biometrics,” “dataregarding biometrics,” and/or similar terms may refer to any kind ofinformation related to biometrics. This may include, but is not limitedto, full and/or partial images of biometrics, digital representations ofbiometrics, hashes, encodings of biometrics, and/or any other digital orother data structure that may indicate and/or store informationregarding one or more biometrics.

The local gallery may be stored in a storage device that is faster toaccess than the main gallery, such as on a more quickly accessiblestorage device (such as on a memory or cache versus a hard drive orother longer term storage), on a closer device that has less networklatency and/or does not require network communication (such as on adevice that performs the biometric matching versus one or more serversand/or server allocations with which the device that performs thebiometric matching communicates), and so on. Alternatively, the localgallery and main gallery may be stored on the same storage device and/ordevice and the improvement to accuracy, latency, and/or throughput maycome from performing biometric matching against the relatively smallersize of the local gallery versus the main gallery.

The accuracy, latency, and/or throughput of performing biometricmatching against the local gallery versus the main gallery may begreatly improved when it is more likely than not that the digitalrepresentations of biometrics corresponding to the biometric matching isstored in the local gallery. If it is not more likely than not that thedigital representations of biometrics corresponding to the biometricmatching is stored in the local gallery, then performing biometricmatching against the local gallery versus the main gallery mayfrequently end up performing biometric matching against both the localgallery and the main gallery without improving accuracy, latency, and/orthroughput. The likelihood that the digital representations ofbiometrics corresponding to the biometric matching is stored in thelocal gallery may be greatly improved via biometric gallery managementusing wireless identifiers.

For example, a biometric station or other device may be able to obtainone or more wireless identifiers that correspond to one or more mobiledevices in an area proximate to the biometric station. Presence of sucha mobile device in the area proximate to the biometric station mayindicate that a person carrying the mobile device may be approaching thebiometric station. If a stored digital representation of a biometricassociated with the wireless identifier (and thus the mobile device) isloaded into a local gallery upon detection of the wireless identifier,accuracy, latency, and/or throughput of an eventual biometricidentification of the person may be improved. In order to facilitatethis, associations between mobile identifiers and digitalrepresentations of biometrics are generated and stored. For example,mobile identifiers detected as present when a digital representation ofa biometric is received may be determined to be associated. Mobileidentifiers that are determined to be coincidentally present (i.e.,carried not by the person corresponding to the digital representation ofthe biometric but to another person present while the personcorresponding to the digital representation of the biometric providesthe digital representation of the biometric) may not be associated, andmobile identifiers that are determined to be associated and are laterdetermined to have been coincidentally present (or are later determinedto no longer be associated, are requested to be removed, and so on) mayhave their associations removed.

The present disclosure relates to biometric gallery management usingwireless identifiers. One or more wireless identifiers that correspondto one or more mobile devices (such as smart phones, tablet computingdevices, cellular telephones, wearable devices, smart watches, fitnessmonitors, digital media players, medical devices, and/or other mobilecomputing devices) that people carry may be associated with digitalrepresentations of biometrics corresponding to the people. Wirelessidentifiers corresponding to mobile devices proximate to a biometricreader device may be monitored. Upon detection of wireless identifierscorresponding to mobile devices proximate to the biometric readerdevice, the associated digital representations of biometrics may beloaded from a main gallery into one or more local galleries, which maythen be used to perform one or more biometric identifications and/orverifications. Associations between digital representations ofbiometrics and one or more wireless identifiers may be determined,stored, and/or updated using digital representations of biometrics fromone or more identifications and/or verifications and wirelessidentifiers corresponding to one or more mobile devices detectedproximate to one or more biometric reader devices.

In this way, accuracy, latency, and/or throughput of biometric matchingand/or systems and/or devices that perform such biometric matching maybe improved. This may improve operation and/or use fewer resources. Assuch, the above may enable performance of functions that were previouslynot performable while expending less work, eliminating unnecessaryhardware and/or other components, and more efficiently using hardware,software, network, and/or other resources. This may improve theoperation of systems and/or devices involved by reducing unnecessarycomponents, increasing the speed at which the systems and/or devicesperform operations, and/or reducing consumption of hardware, software,network, and/or other resources.

These and other embodiments are discussed below with reference to FIGS.1-13 . However, those skilled in the art will readily appreciate thatthe detailed description given herein with respect to these Figures isfor explanatory purposes only and should not be construed as limiting.

FIG. 1 depicts a first example system 100 for biometric gallerymanagement using wireless identifiers. The system 100 may include one ormore biometric identification and/or other stations 102 that areoperable to communicate with one or more servers 101 and/or serverallocations to biometrically identify and/or verify one or more people106.

The system 100 (such as the station 102, the server 101, and so on) mayperform biometric gallery management using wireless identifiers (such asone or more Bluetooth™ identifiers, Bluetooth™ Low Energy or LEidentifiers, cellular identifiers, Wi-Fi identifiers, Ethernetidentifiers, Near-field communication identifiers, media access controladdress identifiers, and so on). One or more wireless identifiers thatcorrespond to one or more mobile devices (such as one or more wearabledevices 104 and/or user devices 103 like one or more smart phones,tablet computing devices, cellular telephones, smart watches, fitnessmonitors, digital media players, medical devices, and/or other mobilecomputing devices) that people 106 carry may be associated with digitalrepresentations of biometrics corresponding to the people 106. Wirelessidentifiers corresponding to mobile devices proximate to the station 102may be monitored. Upon detection of wireless identifiers correspondingto mobile devices proximate to the station 102, the associated digitalrepresentations of biometrics may be loaded from a main gallery into oneor more local galleries, which may then be used to perform one or morebiometric identifications and/or verifications, such as using one ormore cameras 108 and/or other image sensors, fingerprint scanners 109and/or palm print and/or other scanners, and/or other biometric readerdevices of and/or associated with the station 102. Associations betweendigital representations of biometrics and one or more wirelessidentifiers may be determined, stored, and/or updated using digitalrepresentations of biometrics from one or more identifications and/orverifications and wireless identifiers corresponding to one or moremobile devices detected proximate to the station 102.

In this way, accuracy, latency, and/or throughput of biometric matchingand/or the system 100, the server 101, and/or the station 102 may beimproved. This may improve operation and/or use fewer resources. Assuch, the above may enable performance of functions that were previouslynot performable while expending less work, eliminating unnecessaryhardware and/or other components, and more efficiently using hardware,software, network, and/or other resources. This may improve theoperation of the system 100, the server 101, and/or the station 102 byreducing unnecessary components, increasing the speed at which thesystems and/or devices perform operations, and/or reducing consumptionof hardware, software, network, and/or other resources.

In some examples, the local gallery may be stored in a storage devicethat is faster to access than the main gallery, such as on a morequickly accessible storage device (such as on a memory or cache versus ahard drive or other longer term storage), on a closer device that hasless network latency and/or does not require network communication (suchas on the station 102 while the main gallery is stored on the server101), and so on. Alternatively, the local gallery and main gallery maybe stored on the same storage device and/or device (such as the station102 and/or the server 101). Various configurations are possible andcontemplated without departing from the present disclosure.

In some examples, biometric matching against the local gallery that isunsuccessful may failover into matching against the main gallery (and/orone or more local galleries where one or more local galleries arecreated, such as different subsets of the main gallery). Variousconfigurations are possible and contemplated without departing from thepresent disclosure.

The station 102 may perform one or more biometric identifications and/orverifications at one or more various locations for one or more variouspurposes. By way of illustration, the station may perform one or morebiometric identifications and/or verifications at one or more airportsto determine whether or not a person should be allowed access through asecurity area, a boarding gate, and so on. By way of anotherillustration, the station may perform one or more biometricidentifications and/or verifications at one or more sporting and/orother event venues, buildings, and/or other secured areas to determinewhether or not a person has a ticket for and/or should otherwise beallowed access to the sporting and/or other event venue, building,and/or other secured area. In another illustration, the station mayperform one or more biometric identifications and/or verifications atone or more merchant locations and/or merchant devices to process one ormore payments for one or more transactions. In yet another illustration,the station may perform one or more biometric identifications and/orverifications at various locations in order to attest to informationassociated with a person, such as whether or not the person is of aparticular age, whether or not the person is authorized to perform anaction, whether or not the person has a particular vaccination and/orantibody test, whether or not the person has a valid prescription, andso on. Various configurations are possible and contemplated withoutdeparting from the present disclosure.

The system 100 (such as the station 102, the server 101, and so on) maydetermine one or more associations between digital representations ofbiometrics and one or more wireless identifiers corresponding to one ormore mobile devices detected proximate to the station 102 in a varietyof different ways. For example, the system 100 may monitor wirelessidentifiers proximate (such as within a threshold distance, such as 10feet, 300 feet, and so on) to the station 102 (such as using one or morewireless communication units associated with the station 102, one ormore wireless beacons 105 and/or other wireless communication devicesdisposed near the station 102, and so on). The system 100 may associatedetected wireless identifiers with digital representations of biometricsgenerated and/or otherwise obtained via one or more biometric readerdevices of and/or associated with the station 102, such as wirelessidentifiers detected while the digital representations of biometrics areobtained, wireless identifiers detected within a threshold period oftime (such as thirty seconds, one day, and so on) of when the digitalrepresentations of biometrics are obtained, and so on.

In some situations, one or more detected wireless identifiers maycorrespond to one or more mobile devices associated with one or morepeople 106 providing one or more biometrics to the station 102. In othersituations, one or more detected wireless identifiers may correspond toone or more mobile devices associated with people other than the one ormore people providing one or more biometrics to the station 102.Regardless, such wireless identifiers and/or other informationassociated with such detected wireless identifiers may be privateinformation and the system 100 may take steps to protect suchinformation.

By way of example, the system 100 (such as the station 102, the server101, and so on) may anonymize detected wireless identifiers and/orinformation associated with such detected wireless identifiers (such astimes and/or locations where such information was collected, associatedbiometric and/or other identity information, frequency of detection, andso on). By way of illustration, detected wireless identifiers and/orinformation associated with such detected wireless identifiers may behashed and/or otherwise encrypted and/or protected prior to and/orduring storage. In cases where stored detected wireless identifiers arehashed, later detected wireless identifiers may be hashed and the hasheddetected wireless identifiers may be compared to the hashed storedwireless identifiers. Various configurations are possible andcontemplated without departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

By way of another example, the system 100 (such as the station 102, theserver 101, and so on) may be operable to remove detected wirelessidentifiers and/or information associated with such detected wirelessidentifiers and/or associations upon request. In such examples, thesystem 100 may receive a request to remove a wireless identifier and/orinformation associated with such a wireless identifier, determinewhether such a wireless identifier and/or information is associated withsuch a wireless identifier, and/or remove such a wireless identifierand/or the association and/or other information associated with such awireless identifier from storage. Various configurations are possibleand contemplated without departing from the scope of the presentdisclosure.

In yet another example, the system 100 (such as the station 102, theserver 101, and so on) may include one or more opt in options that allowone or more people (such as the person 106) to opt into storage of oneor more wireless identifiers and/or information associated therewith. Byway of illustration, the station 102, the beacon 105, and/or anotherdevice may emit a signal that may be received by a mobile device (suchas the user device 103, the wearable device 104, and so on). The signalmay include information usable by the mobile device to provide one ormore opt in options (such as a text message, an email, a pop upnotification, a web page, and so on) that allows one or more people toopt into the system 100 storing one or more wireless identifiers and/orinformation associated therewith. Alternatively, the station may presentsuch an opt in option via one or more displays 107 and/or other userinterface devices while the person 106 is providing one or morebiometrics and so on. In various examples, the mobile device may obtainone or more digital representations of biometrics to provide along withone or more responses to the opt in option. Various configurations arepossible and contemplated without departing from the scope of thepresent disclosure.

In still another example, a person may opt into storage of one or morewireless identifiers and/or information associated therewith via an appor application on a mobile and/or other device (such as the user device103, the wearable device 104, and so on) that is associated with thesystem 100, the station 102, the server 101, and so on; through variousmechanisms related to one or more accounts maintained by the system 100,the station 102, the server 101, and so on; and/or other mechanisms.Various configurations are possible and contemplated without departingfrom the scope of the present disclosure.

In yet another example, a person may configure and/or allow an app orapplication on a mobile and/or other device (such as the user device103, the wearable device 104, and so on) that is associated with thesystem 100, the station 102, the server 101, and so on to be configuredto detect proximity to the station 102 and/or one or more beacons 105and/or other wireless devices and provide one or more wirelessidentifiers and/or other information (such as one or more digitalrepresentations of biometrics, account information, and so on) to thesystem 100, the station 102, the server 101, and so on. Variousconfigurations are possible and contemplated without departing from thescope of the present disclosure.

In various examples, the station 102, the server 101, and/or the beacon105 may communicate with one or more of the user device 103, thewearable device 104, and/or other mobile devices using one or more ofthe received wireless identifiers. For example, the station 102, theserver 101, and/or the beacon 105 may communicate with one or more ofthe user device 103, the wearable device 104, and/or other mobiledevices to obtain permission to store one or more wireless identifiers,obtain information (such as one or more digital representations ofbiometrics, identity information associated therewith, and so on),confirm associations between one or more wireless identifiers and one ormore digital representations of biometrics, and so on. Variousconfigurations are possible and contemplated without departing from thescope of the present disclosure.

In some examples, the system 100 (such as the station 102, the server101, and so on) may associate all wireless identifiers that are detectedproximate to the station 102 contemporaneous to and/or within a periodof time from obtaining of one or more digital representations ofbiometrics by the station 102. In other examples, the system 100 (suchas the station 102, the server 101, and so on) may attempt to determinewhich of multiple detected wireless identifiers are closest to thestation 102 and associate those determined to be closest. For example,the system 100 may determine relative proximity of the multiple detectedwireless identifiers according to the time when they were first detectedrelative to each other by a wireless communication unit associated withthe station 102, the beacon 105, and/or another device; by triangulatingrelative positions using information received by one or more wirelesscommunication units associated with the station 102, the beacon 105,and/or another device; using global positioning system and/or otherlocation system information; and so on. By way of illustration, a numberof wireless communication devices may be disposed at various distancesfrom the station 102 and information related to communication betweenthe wireless communication devices and one or more mobile devicescorresponding to the multiple detected wireless identifiers may beanalyzed to determine respective proximity of the mobile devices as themobile devices move with respect to the wireless communication devices,each other, and/or the station 102. Various configurations are possibleand contemplated without departing from the scope of the presentdisclosure.

In some examples, the system 100 (such as the station 102, the server101, and so on) may determine and store associations between one or morewireless identifiers and one or more digital representations ofbiometrics and use such stored associations without furthermodification. In other examples, the system 100 (such as the station102, the server 101, and so on) may subsequently analyze the storedassociations in order to modify the stored associations, update thestored associations, improve the accuracy of the stored associations,remove and/or otherwise disassociate one or more of the storedassociations, determine that a wireless identifier is actuallyunassociated with one or more digital representations of biometrics, andso on. Various configurations are possible and contemplated withoutdeparting from the scope of the present disclosure.

For example, the system 100 (such as the station 102, the server 101,and so on) may analyze associations to determine that a single wirelessidentifier is associated with multiple digital representations ofbiometrics. Under the assumption that one of the associated people mayhave been present when a mobile device associated with one of the otherpeople was detected, the system 100 may attempt to remove and/orotherwise disassociate one or more of the associations. For example, thesystem 100 may determine that one of the multiple digitalrepresentations of biometrics was determined to be associated with thewireless identifier multiple times while one or more of the others wasonly determined to be associated once. One or more of the others may beremoved and/or otherwise disassociated. Various configurations arepossible and contemplated without departing from the scope of thepresent disclosure.

By way of another example, the system 100 (such as the station 102, theserver 101, and so on) may analyze associations to determine that awireless identifier was only determined to be associated with a digitalrepresentations of a biometric once. Under the assumption that multipledetections would occur if a corresponding mobile device is trulyassociated with an associated person, the system 100 may remove and/orotherwise disassociate the association. In further examples, the system100 may remove and/or otherwise disassociate the association after athreshold period of time where no further associations are detected(such as one month, one year, and so on), after a threshold number ofidentifications and/or verifications associated with the digitalrepresentations of biometrics are performed (such as one, ten, and soon), and/or the occurrence of one or more other conditions. Variousconfigurations are possible and contemplated without departing from thescope of the present disclosure.

In other examples, the systems 100 (such as the station 102, the server101, and so on) may analyze associations and remove and/or otherwisedisassociate one or more for a variety of different reasons. Suchreasons may include the elapse of a threshold period of time where nofurther associations are detected (such as one month, one year, and soon), performance of a threshold number of identifications and/orverifications associated with the digital representations of biometrics(such as one, ten, and so on) without subsequent determination ofassociation with the wireless identifiers, and so on. Variousconfigurations are possible and contemplated without departing from thescope of the present disclosure.

Although the system 100 is illustrated and described with respect to aparticular configuration, it is understood that this is an example. Byway of illustration, the system 100 is illustrated and described asincluding both the station 102 and the server 101. However, in someimplementations, the station 102 and the server 101 may be combined.Various configurations are possible and contemplated without departingfrom the scope of the present disclosure.

By way of another illustration, the above illustrates and describes thesystem 100 as including the beacon 105. However, it is understood thatthis is an example. In other implementations, the beacon 105 may beomitted. Various configurations are possible and contemplated withoutdeparting from the scope of the present disclosure.

In still another example, the station 102 is illustrated and describedas including the display 107, the camera 108, and the fingerprintscanner 109. However, it is understood that this is an example. In otherimplementations, any biometric reader devices and/or other componentsmay be included or not included. Various configurations are possible andcontemplated without departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

By way of yet another example, the system 100 is illustrated anddescribed above as performing biometric gallery management based ondetecting one or more wireless identifiers corresponding to one or moremobile devices. However, it is understood that this is an example. Inother implementations, the system 100 may perform biometric gallerymanagement using techniques other than detecting one or more wirelessidentifiers corresponding to one or more mobile devices withoutdeparting from the scope of the present disclosure.

By way of illustration, in some implementations, the system 100 mayperform biometric gallery management using information in an app orapplication executing on a mobile device or other electronic device. Byway of example, a person may use the app or application executing on themobile device or other electronic device to check in for a flight, hotelreservation, rental vehicle registration, and/or other item for which aperson may check in. The app or application may be associated with thesystem 100 (such as directly, via another app or application executingon mobile device or other electronic device that is linked to the app orapplication, and so on) and may notify the system 100 (such bycommunicating with the server 101 and/or another device) that the personhas checked in for the flight, hotel reservation, rental vehicleregistration, and/or other item. In response, the system 100 (such asvia the server 101, the station 102, and so on) may determine a locationassociated with the flight, hotel reservation, rental vehicleregistration, and/or other item, determine one or more stations 102associated with the location, and load one or more digitalrepresentations of biometrics associated with the person from a maingallery into one or more local galleries, which may then be used toperform one or more biometric identifications and/or verifications.

In various other implementations, the app or application may accesslocation information for the mobile device or other electronic deviceand notify the system 100 of such, which the system 100 (such as via theserver 101, the station 102, and so on) may use to determine one or moreassociated stations 102 for which to load one or more digitalrepresentations of biometrics associated with the person from the maingallery into the one or more local galleries rather than doing so basedon a determination of a location associated with the flight, hotelreservation, rental vehicle registration, and/or other item. In stillother implementations, the app or application may not be an app orapplication that person uses to check in for a flight, hotelreservation, rental vehicle registration, and/or other item but mayinstead be an app or application that monitors another app orapplication that the person does use to check in for a flight, hotelreservation, rental vehicle registration, and/or other item and themonitoring app or application may notify the system 100 (such bycommunicating with the server 101 and/or another device) based thereon.Various configurations are possible and contemplated without departingfrom the scope of the present disclosure.

By way of another example, rather than an app or application that personuses to check in for a flight, hotel reservation, rental vehicleregistration, and/or other item, in some implementations, the app orapplication executing on the mobile device or other electronic devicemay be an app or application that the person uses for various otherpurposes (such as providing a payment by providing one or more digitalrepresentations of one or more biometrics that are used to accessassociated payment information, providing health-related or other accessauthorization proof providing one or more digital representations of oneor more biometrics that are used to access information related towhether or not the person should be provided access, accessinginformation tailored for the person provided in response to providingone or more digital representations of one or more biometrics that areused to tailor the information for the person, and so on). When theperson uses the app or application, the app or application may accesslocation information for the mobile device or other electronic deviceand notify the system 100 of the app or application use and the locationinformation, which the system 100 (such as via the server 101, thestation 102, and so on) may use to determine one or more associatedstations 102 for which to load one or more digital representations ofbiometrics associated with the person from the main gallery into the oneor more local galleries.

In various other implementations, the system 100 may determine alocation using notice of the use received from the app or applicationrather than the app or application communicating location informationaccessed from the mobile device or other electronic device. In stillother implementations, the app or application may not be an app orapplication that person uses but may instead be an app or applicationthat monitors another app or application that the person does use andthe monitoring app or application may notify the system 100 (such bycommunicating with the server 101 and/or another device) based thereon.Various configurations are possible and contemplated without departingfrom the scope of the present disclosure.

FIG. 2 depicts a system 200 of example relationships between examplecomponents that may be used to implement the first example system 100 ofFIG. 1 . As shown, the server 101, the station 102, the beacon 105, theuser device 103, and/or the wearable device 104 may be communicablyconnected via one or more wired and/or wireless networks.

The server 101 may store identity information (such as one or morenames, addresses, telephone numbers, social security numbers, patientidentification numbers or other identifiers, insurance data, financialdata, health information (such as one or more temperatures, pupildilation, medical diagnoses, immunocompromised conditions, medicalhistories, medical records, infection statuses, vaccinations, immunologydata, results of antibody tests evidencing that a person has had aparticular communicable illness and recovered, blood test results,saliva test results, and/or the like), and so on associated with theidentities of people (which may be verified identities, where theidentities are verified as corresponding to the particular person namedand/or where the identity information is verified as valid).Alternatively and/or additionally, some or all of the health informationmay be stored separately from the identity information but otherwiseassociated with the identity information, such as in a Health InsurancePortability and Accountability Act (“HIPAA”) compliant or other datastore or enclave. Such a data store or enclave may be stored on one ormore different storage media than the identity information, or may bestored on the same storage medium or media and logically isolated fromthe identity information. The health information may be simultaneouslyand/or substantially simultaneously accessible as the identityinformation, such as where the identity information includes a healthinformation identifier or key that may be used to access the separatelystored health information. The identity system device may control accessto the identity information and/or the health information usingidentification information that is associated with the identityinformation. The identification information may include digitalrepresentations of biometrics and/or other biometric information orbiometric data (which may include one or more digital representations ofone or more fingerprints, palm prints, blood vessel scans, palm-veinscans, voice prints, facial images, retina images, iris images,deoxyribonucleic acid sequences, heart rhythms, gaits, and so on), oneor more logins and/or passwords, authorization tokens, social mediaand/or other accounts, and so on. In various implementations, the server101 may allow the person associated with an identity to control accessto the identity information, the health information, and/or otherinformation (such as payment account information, health information(such as medical records, HIPAA protected information in order to becompliant with various legal restrictions, and so on), contactinformation, and so on. The server 101 may control access to suchinformation according to input received from the person. The server maybe operable to communicate with the station 102 in order to handlerequests to provide the identity information and/or the healthinformation, update and/or otherwise add to the identity informationand/or the health information, provide attestations regarding and/orrelated to the identity information and/or the health information (suchas whether or not a person is of a particular age, whether or not aperson has a particular license or insurance policy, whether or not aperson has been monitored as having particular health information,whether or not a person has had a particular vaccination, whether or notan antibody test evidences that a person has had a particularcommunicable illness and recovered, whether or not a person has aparticular ticket or authorization, whether or not a person has beenmonitored as having particular antibodies, whether or not a person hasbeen assigned a particular medical diagnosis, and so on), evaluatehealth information stored in the identity information and/or otherwiseassociated with the identity information and/or other information storedin the identity information, perform transactions, allow or deny access,route one or more persons, and/or perform one or more other actions.

The server 101 may be any kind of electronic device and/or cloud and/orother computing arrangement. Examples of such devices include, but arenot limited to, one or more desktop computing devices, laptop computingdevices, mobile computing devices, wearable devices, tablet computingdevices, mobile telephones, kiosks and/or other stations, smart phones,printers, displays, vehicles, kitchen appliances, entertainment systemdevices, digital media players, and so on. The server 101 may includeone or more processors 230 and/or other processing units or controllers,communication units 232, non-transitory storage media 231 (which maytake the form of, but is not limited to, a magnetic storage medium;optical storage medium; magneto-optical storage medium; read onlymemory; random access memory; erasable programmable memory; flashmemory; and so on), and/or other components. The processor 230 mayexecute one or more sets of instructions stored in the non-transitorystorage medium 231 to perform various functions, such as receivingand/or storing digital representations of biometrics and/or otherbiometric information and/or other identification information, receivingand/or storing identity information and/or health information, matchingone or more received digital representations of biometrics and/or otheridentification information to stored data, retrieving identityinformation and/or health information associated with stored datamatching one or more received digital representations of biometricsand/or other identification information, providing retrieved identityinformation and/or health information, maintaining one or more galleries(such as a main gallery and/or one or more local galleries stored by theserver 101, the station 102, and so on) communicating with the station102 via the network 220 using the communication unit 232, and so on.Alternatively and/or additionally, the server 101 may involve one ormore memory allocations configured to store at least one executableasset and one or more processor allocations configured to access the oneor more memory allocations and execute the at least one executable assetto instantiate one or more processes and/or services, such as one ormore gallery management services, biometric identifications services,and so on. Various configurations are possible and contemplated withoutdeparting from the scope of the present disclosure.

Similarly, the station 102 may be any kind of device. The electronicdevice may include one or more processors 233 and/or other processingunits and/or controllers, one or more non-transitory storage media 234,one or more communication units 235, one or more displays (such as thedisplay 107 shown in FIG. 1 ), one or more health sensors (such as athermometer and/or other thermal sensor, a blood pressure sensor, ablood test sensor, a blood vessel scanner, a palm-vein scanner, a stillimage and/or video camera, a 2D and/or 3D image sensor, a saliva sensor,breath sensor, a deoxyribonucleic acid sensor, a heart rhythm monitor, amicrophone, sweat sensors, and so on), one or more biometric readers(such as the fingerprint scanner 109, a blood vessel scanner, apalm-vein scanner, an optical fingerprint scanner, a phosphorescentfingerprint scanner), the camera 108 (which may be a still image and/orvideo camera), a 2D and/or 3D image sensor, a capacitive sensor, asaliva sensor, a deoxyribonucleic acid sensor, a heart rhythm monitor, amicrophone, and so on), and/or one or more other components. Theprocessor may execute one or more sets of instructions stored in thenon-transitory storage media to perform various functions, such as usingthe biometric reader to obtain one or more digital representations ofone or more biometrics (such as a digital representation of afingerprint, a blood vessel scan, a palm-vein scan, a voiceprint, afacial image, a retina image, an iris image, a deoxyribonucleic acidsequence, a heart rhythm, a gait, and so on) for a person, obtain healthinformation for a person using the health sensor, communicate with theserver 101 via the network using the communication unit, and so on.Various configurations are possible and contemplated without departingfrom the scope of the present disclosure.

Likewise, the beacon 105 may include one or more processors 227,communication units 229, non-transitory storage media 228 and/or othercomponents; the user device 103 may include one or more processors 221,communication units 222, non-transitory storage media 223 and/or othercomponents; and the wearable device 104 may include one or moreprocessors 224, communication units 225, non-transitory storage media226 and/or other components. Various configurations are possible andcontemplated without departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

As used herein, the term “computing resource” (along with other similarterms and phrases, including, but not limited to, “computing device” and“computing network”) refers to any physical and/or virtual electronicdevice or machine component, or set or group of interconnected and/orcommunicably coupled physical and/or virtual electronic devices ormachine components, suitable to execute or cause to be executed one ormore arithmetic or logical operations on digital data.

Example computing resources contemplated herein include, but are notlimited to: single or multi-core processors; single or multi-threadprocessors; purpose-configured co-processors (e.g., graphics processingunits, motion processing units, sensor processing units, and the like);volatile or non-volatile memory; application-specific integratedcircuits; field-programmable gate arrays; input/output devices andsystems and components thereof (e.g., keyboards, mice, trackpads,generic human interface devices, video cameras, microphones, speakers,and the like); networking appliances and systems and components thereof(e.g., routers, switches, firewalls, packet shapers, content filters,network interface controllers or cards, access points, modems, and thelike); embedded devices and systems and components thereof (e.g.,system(s)-on-chip, Internet-of-Things devices, and the like); industrialcontrol or automation devices and systems and components thereof (e.g.,programmable logic controllers, programmable relays, supervisory controland data acquisition controllers, discrete controllers, and the like);vehicle or aeronautical control devices systems and components thereof(e.g., navigation devices, safety devices or controllers, securitydevices, and the like); corporate or business infrastructure devices orappliances (e.g., private branch exchange devices, voice-over internetprotocol hosts and controllers, end-user terminals, and the like);personal electronic devices and systems and components thereof (e.g.,cellular phones, tablet computers, desktop computers, laptop computers,wearable devices); personal electronic devices and accessories thereof(e.g., peripheral input devices, wearable devices, implantable devices,medical devices and so on); and so on. It may be appreciated that theforegoing examples are not exhaustive.

Example information can include, but may not be limited to: personalidentification information (e.g., names, social security numbers,telephone numbers, email addresses, physical addresses, driver's licenseinformation, passport numbers, and so on); identity documents (e.g.,drivers licenses, passports, government identification cards orcredentials, and so on); protected health information (e.g., medicalrecords, dental records, and so on); financial, banking, credit, or debtinformation; third-party service account information (e.g., usernames,passwords, social media handles, and so on); encrypted or unencryptedfiles; database files; network connection logs; shell history;filesystem files; libraries, frameworks, and binaries; registry entries;settings files; executing processes; hardware vendors, versions, and/orinformation associated with the compromised computing resource;installed applications or services; password hashes; idle time, uptime,and/or last login time; document files; product renderings; presentationfiles; image files; customer information; configuration files;passwords; and so on. It may be appreciated that the foregoing examplesare not exhaustive.

The foregoing examples and description of instances ofpurpose-configured software, whether accessible via API as arequest-response service, an event-driven service, or whether configuredas a self-contained data processing service are understood as notexhaustive. In other words, a person of skill in the art may appreciatethat the various functions and operations of a system such as describedherein can be implemented in a number of suitable ways, developedleveraging any number of suitable libraries, frameworks, first orthird-party APIs, local or remote databases (whether relational, NoSQL,or other architectures, or a combination thereof), programminglanguages, software design techniques (e.g., procedural, asynchronous,event-driven, and so on or any combination thereof), and so on. Thevarious functions described herein can be implemented in the same manner(as one example, leveraging a common language and/or design), or indifferent ways. In many embodiments, functions of a system describedherein are implemented as discrete microservices, which may becontainerized or executed/instantiated leveraging a discrete virtualmachine, that are only responsive to authenticated API requests fromother microservices of the same system. Similarly, each microservice maybe configured to provide data output and receive data input across anencrypted data channel. In some cases, each microservice may beconfigured to store its own data in a dedicated encrypted database; inothers, microservices can store encrypted data in a common database;whether such data is stored in tables shared by multiple microservicesor whether microservices may leverage independent and separatetables/schemas can vary from embodiment to embodiment. As a result ofthese described and other equivalent architectures, it may beappreciated that a system such as described herein can be implemented ina number of suitable ways. For simplicity of description, manyembodiments that follow are described in reference to an implementationin which discrete functions of the system are implemented as discretemicroservices. It is appreciated that this is merely one possibleimplementation.

As described herein, the term “processor” refers to any software and/orhardware-implemented data processing device or circuit physically and/orstructurally configured to instantiate one or more classes or objectsthat are purpose-configured to perform specific transformations of dataincluding operations represented as code and/or instructions included ina program that can be stored within, and accessed from, a memory. Thisterm is meant to encompass a single processor or processing unit,multiple processors, multiple processing units, analog or digitalcircuits, or other suitably configured computing element or combinationof elements.

FIG. 3 depicts a first example method 300 for biometric gallerymanagement using wireless identifiers. This first example method 300 maybe performed by the systems 100, 200, 800, 900 of FIGS. 1, 2, 8 , and/or9.

At operation 310, an electronic device (such as the station 102 of FIG.1 , the server 101 of FIG. 1 , and so on) may receive one or morewireless identifiers (such as one or more Bluetooth™ identifiers,Bluetooth™ Low Energy or LE identifiers, cellular identifiers, Wi-Fiidentifiers, Ethernet identifiers, Near-field communication identifiers,media access control address identifiers, and so on). At operation 320,the electronic device may determine whether or not the one or morewireless identifiers are known. For example, the electronic device maycompare the one or more wireless identifiers against one or more storedassociations between wireless identifiers and one or more digitalrepresentations of biometrics (such as one or more digitalrepresentations of one or more fingerprints, palm prints, blood vesselscans, palm-vein scans, voice prints, facial images, retina images, irisimages, deoxyribonucleic acid sequences, heart rhythms, gaits, and soon) that correspond to one or more identities. If so, the flow mayproceed to operation 330 where the electronic device may load data (suchas the digital representations of biometrics) associated with the one ormore wireless identifiers into a local gallery from a main gallerybefore the flow may proceed to operation 340. Otherwise, the flow mayproceed to operation 340 directly.

At operation 340, the electronic device may receive one or more digitalrepresentations of biometrics (such as one or more digitalrepresentations of one or more fingerprints, palm prints, blood vesselscans, palm-vein scans, voice prints, facial images, retina images, irisimages, deoxyribonucleic acid sequences, heart rhythms, gaits, and soon). At operation 350, the electronic device may attempt to perform oneor more biometric identifications and/or verifications.

For example, the electronic device may first attempt to perform abiometric identification using the local gallery. If the identificationusing the local gallery fails, the electronic device may attempt toperform the identification using the main gallery. Variousconfigurations are possible and contemplated without departing from thescope of the present disclosure.

At operation 360, the electronic device may determine possibleassociations between the wireless identifier and the digitalrepresentation of the biometric. For example, the electronic device maymonitor wireless identifiers proximate (such as within a thresholddistance, such as 10 feet, 300 feet, and so on) to a station (such asusing one or more wireless communication units associated with thestation, one or more wireless beacons and/or other wirelesscommunication devices disposed near the station, and so on). Theelectronic device may associate detected wireless identifiers withdigital representations of biometrics obtained via one or more biometricreader devices of and/or associated with the station, such as wirelessidentifiers detected while the digital representations of biometrics areobtained, wireless identifiers detected within a threshold period oftime (such as thirty seconds, one day, and so on) of when the digitalrepresentations of biometrics are obtained, and so on. At operation 370,the electronic device may store such an association if one isdetermined.

The flow may then return to operation 310 where the electronic devicemay again receive one or more wireless identifiers.

By way of example, a server may receive a wireless identifier obtainedby a station and/or another electronic device proximate to the station.The server may determine whether or not the wireless identifier isknown, load associated data into a local gallery (which may be stored atthe station, at the server, and so on) from a main gallery if thewireless identifier is known, receive a digital representation of abiometric, attempt to perform an identification using the local gallery,attempt to perform the identification using the main gallery ifidentification using the local gallery fails, determine possibleassociations between the wireless identifier and the digitalrepresentation of the biometric, and store such an association if one isdetermined.

By way of another example, a station may receive a wireless identifierusing a communication unit and/or another electronic device proximate tothe station. The station may determine whether or not the wirelessidentifier is known (such as by transmitting the wireless identifier toa server), load associated data (such as by communicating with theserver to obtain and/or otherwise appropriately load the associateddata) into a local gallery (which may be stored at the station, at theserver, and so on) from a main gallery if the wireless identifier isknown, receive a digital representation of a biometric, attempt toperform an identification using the local gallery (such as by comparingthe digital representation of the biometric to the local gallery and/ortransmitting the digital representation of the biometric to the serverfor comparison), attempt to perform the identification using the maingallery if identification using the local gallery fails (such as bycomparing the digital representation of the biometric to the localgallery and/or transmitting the digital representation of the biometricto the server for comparison), determine possible associations betweenthe wireless identifier and the digital representation of the biometric,and store such an association if one is determined.

In various examples, this example method 300 may be implemented using agroup of interrelated software modules or components that performvarious functions discussed herein. These software modules or componentsmay be executed within a cloud network and/or by one or more computingdevices, such as the server 101 of FIG. 1 .

Although the example method 300 is illustrated and described asincluding particular operations performed in a particular order, it isunderstood that this is an example. In various implementations, variousorders of the same, similar, and/or different operations may beperformed without departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

For example, the method 300 is illustrated and described as loading dataassociated with detected wireless identifiers into a local gallery,attempting to perform biometric identifications, and storingassociations between wireless identifiers and biometrics. However, it isunderstood that this is an example. In various implementations, one ormore of these functions may be omitted and/or performed by other devicesand/or systems. Various configurations are possible and contemplatedwithout departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

FIG. 4 depicts a second example method 400 for biometric gallerymanagement using wireless identifiers. This second example method 400may be performed by the systems 100, 200, 800, 900 of FIGS. 1, 2, 8 ,and/or 9.

At operation 410, an electronic device (such as the station 102 of FIG.1 , the server 101 of FIG. 1 , and so on) may receive one or morewireless identifiers. At operation 420, the electronic device mayanonymize the wireless identifier, such as by hashing the wirelessidentifier. At operation 430, the electronic device may compare theanonymized wireless identifier with one or more stored anonymizedwireless identifiers (such as stored hashed wireless identifiers).

At operation 440, the electronic device may determine whether or notthere is a correspondence between the anonymized wireless identifier andthe one or more stored anonymized wireless identifiers. If not, theelectronic device may determine that the wireless identifiers is unknownat operation 450 before the flow may proceed to operation 460 where theelectronic device may store the anonymized wireless identifier (and/orone or more associations between the anonymized wireless identifier andother information, such as digital representations of biometrics).Otherwise, the electronic device may determine that the wirelessidentifier is known at operation 470 before the flow may proceed tooperation 460 where the electronic device may store the anonymizedwireless identifier (and/or one or more associations between theanonymized wireless identifier and other information, such as digitalrepresentations of biometrics).

In various examples, this example method 400 may be implemented using agroup of interrelated software modules or components that performvarious functions discussed herein. These software modules or componentsmay be executed within a cloud network and/or by one or more computingdevices, such as the server 101 of FIG. 1 .

Although the example method 400 is illustrated and described asincluding particular operations performed in a particular order, it isunderstood that this is an example. In various implementations, variousorders of the same, similar, and/or different operations may beperformed without departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

For example, the method 400 may include the additional operation ofloading data associated with a wireless identifier into a local galleryfrom a main gallery upon determining that the wireless identifier isknown at operation 470. Various configurations are possible andcontemplated without departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

FIG. 5 depicts a third example method 500 for biometric gallerymanagement using wireless identifiers. This third example method 500 maybe performed by the systems 100, 200, 800, 900 of FIGS. 1, 2, 8 , and/or9.

At operation 510, an electronic device (such as the station 102 of FIG.1 , the server 101 of FIG. 1 , and so on) may receive one or morerequests to remove one or more wireless identifiers and/or associationsand/or associated information from a storage. Such a storage maymaintain one or more associations between stored wireless identifiersand other data, such as digital representations of biometrics. The flowmay then proceed to operation 520.

At operation 520, the electronic device may determine whether or not thewireless identifier requested for removal can be located in the storage.If so, the flow may proceed to operation 530 where the electronic deviceremoves the wireless identifier and/or the association from the storage.Otherwise, the flow may proceed to operation 540 where the electronicdevice may reply that the wireless identifier is not stored.

In various examples, this example method 500 may be implemented using agroup of interrelated software modules or components that performvarious functions discussed herein. These software modules or componentsmay be executed within a cloud network and/or by one or more computingdevices, such as the server 101 of FIG. 1 .

Although the example method 500 is illustrated and described asincluding particular operations performed in a particular order, it isunderstood that this is an example. In various implementations, variousorders of the same, similar, and/or different operations may beperformed without departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

For example, operation 540 is illustrated and described as replying whenthe wireless identifier cannot be located in the storage. However, it isunderstood that this is an example. In various implementations, theelectronic device may not provide any information regarding whether ornot a particular wireless identifier is stored, though the electronicdevice may remove the wireless identifier and/or the association uponrequest. Various configurations are possible and contemplated withoutdeparting from the scope of the present disclosure.

By way of another example, the method 500 is illustrated and describedas the electronic device removing the wireless identifier from thestorage. However, it is understood that this is an example. In otherimplementations, the electronic device may instead instruct anotherdevice to remove the wireless identifier and/or the association from thestorage. Various configurations are possible and contemplated withoutdeparting from the scope of the present disclosure.

FIG. 6 depicts a fourth example method 600 for biometric gallerymanagement using wireless identifiers. This fourth example method 600may be performed by the systems 100, 200, 800, 900 of FIGS. 1, 2, 8 ,and/or 9.

At operation 610, an electronic device (such as the user device 103, thewearable device 104, and so on) may receive one or more wireless beaconsignals. The one or more wireless beacon signals may be received fromone or more wireless beacons and/or other wireless communication devicesincluded within and/or positioned proximate to one or more biometricidentification stations.

At operation 620, the electronic device may use the signal to provideone or more wireless identifiers opt in options. For example, the signalmay cause the electronic device to present a web page that presents anoption to opt in to providing one or more wireless identifiersassociated with the electronic device to one or more systems or devices.By way of another example, the signal may cause the electronic device tolaunch an app or application that presents an option to opt in toproviding one or more wireless identifiers associated with theelectronic device to one or more systems or devices that are associatedwith the app or application.

At operation 630, the electronic device may determine whether or not theoption to opt in is selected, such as by a user of the electronicdevice. If so, the electronic device may provide the one or morewireless identifiers at operation 640. Otherwise, the electronic devicemay omit providing the one or more wireless identifiers at operation650.

In various examples, this example method 600 may be implemented using agroup of interrelated software modules or components that performvarious functions discussed herein. These software modules or componentsmay be executed within a cloud network and/or by one or more computingdevices, such as the server 101 of FIG. 1 .

Although the example method 600 is illustrated and described asincluding particular operations performed in a particular order, it isunderstood that this is an example. In various implementations, variousorders of the same, similar, and/or different operations may beperformed without departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

For example, the method 600 is illustrated and described as bothproviding the option to opt in and determining whether or not the optionto opt in is selected. However, it is understood that this is anexample. In other implementations, the electronic device may perform oneof these operations while one or more other devices or systems performthe other. Various configurations are possible and contemplated withoutdeparting from the scope of the present disclosure.

FIG. 7 depicts a fifth example method 700 for biometric gallerymanagement using wireless identifiers. This fifth example method 700 maybe performed by the systems 100, 200, 800, 900 of FIGS. 1, 2, 8 , and/or9.

At operation 710, an electronic device (such as the station 102 of FIG.1 , the server 101 of FIG. 1 , and so on) may analyze one or more storedwireless identifiers. At operation 720, the electronic device maydetermine whether or not one or more stored wireless identifiers areassociated with multiple digital representations of biometrics. If so,this may mean that one or more of the associations may have been made inerror and the flow may proceed to operation 730 where the electronicdevice attempts to remove and/or otherwise disassociate one or more ofthe associations before the flow proceeds to operation 740. Otherwise,the flow may proceed directly to operation 740.

At operation 740, the electronic device may determine whether or not oneor more stored wireless identifiers are associated with a thresholdnumber of subsequent biometric identifications (such as one, ten, and soon). If not, this may mean that one or more of the associations may havebeen made in error and the flow may proceed to operation 750 where theelectronic device may remove and/or otherwise disassociate one or moreof the associations before the flow proceeds to operation 760.Otherwise, the flow may proceed directly to operation 760.

At operation 760, the electronic device may determine whether or not oneor more stored wireless identifier associations have aged out. The oneor more stored wireless identifier associations have aged out if asubsequent association has not been stored within a threshold period oftime (such as one month, one year, and so on). If so, this may mean thatone or more of the associations may have been made in error and/or mayno longer be valid and the flow may proceed to operation 750 where theelectronic device may remove and/or otherwise disassociate one or moreof the associations before the flow may end. Otherwise, the flow mayproceed to operation 770 where the electronic device may determine toretain the one or more stored wireless identifier associations beforethe flow may end.

In various examples, this example method 700 may be implemented using agroup of interrelated software modules or components that performvarious functions discussed herein. These software modules or componentsmay be executed within a cloud network and/or by one or more computingdevices, such as the server 101 of FIG. 1 .

Although the example method 700 is illustrated and described asincluding particular operations performed in a particular order, it isunderstood that this is an example. In various implementations, variousorders of the same, similar, and/or different operations may beperformed without departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

For example, the method 700 is illustrated and described as includingoperations 710-730, 740-750, and 760-770. However, it is understood thatthis is an example. In various implementations, one or more of theseoperations may be omitted and/or performed by one or more other systemsand/or devices. Various configurations are possible and contemplatedwithout departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

By way of another example, the method 700 may include additionaloperations for determining and/or removing one or more erroneouslydetermined and/or no longer valid associations related to one or morewireless identifiers. Various configurations are possible andcontemplated without departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

FIG. 8 depicts a second example system 800 for biometric gallerymanagement using wireless identifiers. This system 800 may include adevice 850 where a person 806 may request that one or more wirelessidentifiers and/or associations be removed and/or otherwisedisassociated from storage. The device 850 may perform the method 500 ofFIG. 5 , communicate with one or more devices that perform the method500 of FIG. 5 , and so on. Various configurations are possible andcontemplated without departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

By way of illustration, the device 850 may detect a user device 803, awearable device 804, and/or one or more other devices that the person iscarrying and/or that are proximate. The device 850 may presentinformation related to the user device 803, the wearable device 804,and/or one or more other devices on a display 851 and/or other userinterface and the person 806 may be able to select that the device 850remove and/or otherwise disassociate one or more wireless identifiersand/or associations related to the user device 803, the wearable device804, and/or one or more other devices from storage. Variousconfigurations are possible and contemplated without departing from thescope of the present disclosure.

In another example, the device 850 may not detect the user device 803,the wearable device 804, and/or one or more other devices. Instead, theperson 806 may provide information regarding the user device 803, thewearable device 804, and/or one or more other devices to the device 850.Various configurations are possible and contemplated without departingfrom the scope of the present disclosure.

FIG. 9 depicts a second example system 900 for biometric gallerymanagement using wireless identifiers. This system 900 may include auser device 903 that is operable to present an opt in option to opt intostorage of one or more wireless identifiers and/or informationassociated therewith. In some examples, the user device 903 may providethe opt in option in response to one or more signals received from oneor more wireless beacons and/or other wireless communication devices. Invarious examples, the user device 903 may perform the method 600 of FIG.6 , communicate with one or more devices that perform the method 600 ofFIG. 6 , and so on. Various configurations are possible and contemplatedwithout departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

FIG. 10 depicts a sixth example method 1000 for biometric gallerymanagement using wireless identifiers. This sixth example method 1000may be performed by the systems 100, 200, 800, 900 of FIGS. 1, 2, 8 ,and/or 9.

At operation 1010, an electronic device (such as the station 102 of FIG.1 , the server 101 of FIG. 1 , and so on) may receive one or morewireless identifiers. At operation 1020, the electronic device may usethe one or more wireless identifiers to load one or more localgalleries. For example, the electronic device may use the one or morewireless identifiers to load one or more local galleries from a maingallery. At operation 1030, the electronic device may attempt to performone or more biometric identifications using the local gallery

In various examples, this example method 1000 may be implemented using agroup of interrelated software modules or components that performvarious functions discussed herein. These software modules or componentsmay be executed within a cloud network and/or by one or more computingdevices, such as the server 101 of FIG. 1 .

Although the example method 1000 is illustrated and described asincluding particular operations performed in a particular order, it isunderstood that this is an example. In various implementations, variousorders of the same, similar, and/or different operations may beperformed without departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

For example, the method 1000 is illustrated and described as includingoperations 1010-1020 and operation 1030. However, it is understood thatthis in an example. In various implementations, one or more of theseoperations may be omitted and/or performed by one or more other devicesand/or systems. Various configurations are possible and contemplatedwithout departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

FIG. 11 depicts a seventh example method 1100 for biometric gallerymanagement using wireless identifiers. This seventh example method 1100may be performed by the systems 100, 200, 800, 900 of FIGS. 1, 2, 8 ,and/or 9.

At operation 1110, an electronic device (such as the station 102 of FIG.1 , the server 101 of FIG. 1 , and so on) may receive one or morewireless identifiers. At operation 1120, the electronic device mayreceive one or more digital representations of one or more biometrics.For example, the electronic device may receive the one or more digitalrepresentations of the one or more biometrics as part of performing oneor more biometric identifications and/or verifications. By way ofanother example, the electronic device may receive the one or moredigital representations of the one or more biometrics as part ofassociating the one or more digital representations of the one or morebiometrics with the one or more wireless identifiers (such as when theone or more digital representations of the one or more biometrics arereceived from an app or application executing on a mobile device that isoperable to associate the one or more digital representations of the oneor more biometrics with one or more wireless identifiers associated withthe mobile device).

At operation 1130, the electronic device may associate the one or moredigital representations of the one or more biometrics with the one ormore wireless identifiers. The flow may then proceed to operation 1140where the electronic device may store the one or more associations.

In various examples, this example method 1100 may be implemented using agroup of interrelated software modules or components that performvarious functions discussed herein. These software modules or componentsmay be executed within a cloud network and/or by one or more computingdevices, such as the server 101 of FIG. 1 .

Although the example method 1100 is illustrated and described asincluding particular operations performed in a particular order, it isunderstood that this is an example. In various implementations, variousorders of the same, similar, and/or different operations may beperformed without departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

For example, the operation 1140 is illustrated and described as storingthe one or more associations. However, it is understood that this in anexample. In various implementations, the electronic device may insteaddirect another device and/or system to store the associations. Variousconfigurations are possible and contemplated without departing from thescope of the present disclosure.

FIG. 12 depicts a fourth example system 1200 for biometric gallerymanagement using wireless identifiers. The system 1200 may include oneor more biometric identification and/or other stations 1202 that areoperable to communicate with one or more servers 1201 and/or serverallocations via one or more networks 1220 to biometrically identifyand/or verify one or more people and/or one or more mobile devicesand/or other electronic devices 1203 that are able to execute one ormore apps and/or applications and communicate with the one or moreservers 1201 via one or more networks 1220.

In various implementations, the system 1200 may perform biometricgallery management using information in an app or application executingon the mobile device and/or other electronic device 1203. By way ofexample, a person may use the app or application executing on the mobiledevice and/or other electronic device 1203 to check in for a flight,hotel reservation, rental vehicle registration, and/or other item forwhich a person may check in. The app or application may be associatedwith the system 1200 (such as directly, via another app or applicationexecuting on mobile device or other electronic device that is linked tothe app or application, and so on) and may notify the system 1200 (suchby communicating with the server 1201 and/or another device) that theperson has checked in for the flight, hotel reservation, rental vehicleregistration, and/or other item. In response, the system 1200 (such asvia the server 1201, the station 1202, and so on) may determine alocation associated with the flight, hotel reservation, rental vehicleregistration, and/or other item, determine one or more stations 1202associated with the location, and load one or more digitalrepresentations of biometrics associated with the person from a maingallery into one or more local galleries, which may then be used toperform one or more biometric identifications and/or verifications.

In various other implementations, the app or application may accesslocation information for the mobile device and/or other electronicdevice 1203 and notify the system 1200 of such, which the system 1200(such as via the server 1201, the station 1202, and so on) may use todetermine one or more associated stations 1202 for which to load one ormore digital representations of biometrics associated with the personfrom the main gallery into the one or more local galleries rather thandoing so based on a determination of a location associated with theflight, hotel reservation, rental vehicle registration, and/or otheritem. In still other implementations, the app or application may not bean app or application that person uses to check in for a flight, hotelreservation, rental vehicle registration, and/or other item but mayinstead be an app or application that monitors another app orapplication that the person does use to check in for a flight, hotelreservation, rental vehicle registration, and/or other item and themonitoring app or application may notify the system 1200 (such bycommunicating with the server 1201 and/or another device) based thereon.Various configurations are possible and contemplated without departingfrom the scope of the present disclosure.

By way of another example, rather than an app or application that personuses to check in for a flight, hotel reservation, rental vehicleregistration, and/or other item, in some implementations, the app orapplication executing on the mobile device and/or other electronicdevice 1203 may be an app or application that the person uses forvarious other purposes (such as providing a payment by providing one ormore digital representations of one or more biometrics that are used toaccess associated payment information, providing health-related or otheraccess authorization proof providing one or more digital representationsof one or more biometrics that are used to access information related towhether or not the person should be provided access, accessinginformation tailored for the person provided in response to providingone or more digital representations of one or more biometrics that areused to tailor the information for the person, and so on). When theperson uses the app or application, the app or application may accesslocation information for the mobile device and/or other electronicdevice 1203 and notify the system 1200 of the app or application use andthe location information, which the system 1200 (such as via the server1201, the station 1202, and so on) may use to determine one or moreassociated stations 1202 for which to load one or more digitalrepresentations of biometrics associated with the person from a maingallery into one or more local galleries.

In various other implementations, the system 1200 may determine alocation using notice of the use received from the app or applicationrather than the app or application communicating location informationaccessed from the mobile device and/or other electronic device 1203. Instill other implementations, the app or application may not be an app orapplication that person uses but may instead be an app or applicationthat monitors another app or application that the person does use andthe monitoring app or application may notify the system 1200 (such bycommunicating with the server 1201 and/or another device) based thereon.Various configurations are possible and contemplated without departingfrom the scope of the present disclosure.

FIG. 13 depicts an eighth example method 1300 for biometric gallerymanagement using wireless identifiers. This eighth example method 1300may be performed by the system 1200 of FIG. 12 .

At operation 1310, an electronic device (such as the station 1202 ofFIG. 12 , the server 1201 of FIG. 12 , and so on) may receivenotification of use of one or more apps or applications executing on oneor more mobile devices and/or other electronic devices. By way ofexample, the app or application executing may be one that a person usesto check in for a flight, hotel reservation, rental vehicleregistration, and/or other item for which a person may check in. By wayof another example, rather than an app or application that person usesto check in for a flight, hotel reservation, rental vehicleregistration, and/or other item, in some implementations, the app orapplication may be an app or application that the person uses forvarious other purposes (such as providing a payment by providing one ormore digital representations of one or more biometrics that are used toaccess associated payment information, providing health-related or otheraccess authorization proof providing one or more digital representationsof one or more biometrics that are used to access information related towhether or not the person should be provided access, accessinginformation tailored for the person provided in response to providingone or more digital representations of one or more biometrics that areused to tailor the information for the person, and so on).

At operation 1320, the electronic device may determine one or morelocations and/or stations associated with the use. For example, theelectronic device may determine one or more locations and/or stationscorresponding to a flight, hotel reservation, rental vehicleregistration, and/or other item for which the person checked in. By wayof another example, the app or application may access locationinformation for the mobile device and/or other electronic device andnotify the electronic device of the location information, which theelectronic device may use to determine one or more associated stations.In still other examples, the electronic device may determine a locationusing notice of the use received from the app or application rather thanthe app or application communicating location information accessed fromthe mobile device and/or other electronic device. In yet otherimplementations, the app or application may not be an app or applicationthat person uses but may instead be an app or application that monitorsanother app or application that the person does use and the monitoringapp or application may notify the electronic device based thereon.

At operation 1330, the electronic device may load one or more digitalrepresentations of one or more biometrics into one or more localgalleries from a main gallery according to the determination.

By way of example, a person may use the app or application executing onthe mobile device and/or other electronic device to check in for aflight, hotel reservation, rental vehicle registration, and/or otheritem for which a person may check in. The app or application may beassociated with the electronic device (such as directly, via another appor application executing on mobile device or other electronic devicethat is linked to the app or application, and so on) and may notify theelectronic device that the person has checked in for the flight, hotelreservation, rental vehicle registration, and/or other item. Inresponse, the electronic device may determine a location associated withthe flight, hotel reservation, rental vehicle registration, and/or otheritem, determine one or more stations associated with the location, andload one or more digital representations of biometrics associated withthe person from a main gallery into one or more local galleries, whichmay then be used to perform one or more biometric identifications and/orverifications.

In various other implementations, the app or application may accesslocation information for the mobile device and/or other electronicdevice and notify the electronic device of such, which the electronicdevice may use to determine one or more associated stations for which toload one or more digital representations of biometrics associated withthe person from the main gallery into the one or more local galleriesrather than doing so based on a determination of a location associatedwith the flight, hotel reservation, rental vehicle registration, and/orother item. In still other implementations, the app or application maynot be an app or application that person uses to check in for a flight,hotel reservation, rental vehicle registration, and/or other item butmay instead be an app or application that monitors another app orapplication that the person does use to check in for a flight, hotelreservation, rental vehicle registration, and/or other item and themonitoring app or application may notify the electronic device basedthereon. Various configurations are possible and contemplated withoutdeparting from the scope of the present disclosure.

By way of another example, rather than an app or application that personuses to check in for a flight, hotel reservation, rental vehicleregistration, and/or other item, in some implementations, the app orapplication executing on the mobile device and/or other electronicdevice may be an app or application that the person uses for variousother purposes (such as providing a payment by providing one or moredigital representations of one or more biometrics that are used toaccess associated payment information, providing health-related or otheraccess authorization proof providing one or more digital representationsof one or more biometrics that are used to access information related towhether or not the person should be provided access, accessinginformation tailored for the person provided in response to providingone or more digital representations of one or more biometrics that areused to tailor the information for the person, and so on). When theperson uses the app or application, the app or application may accesslocation information for the mobile device and/or other electronicdevice and notify the electronic device of the app or application useand the location information, which the electronic device may use todetermine one or more associated stations for which to load one or moredigital representations of biometrics associated with the person from amain gallery into one or more local galleries.

In various other implementations, the electronic device may determine alocation using notice of the use received from the app or applicationrather than the app or application communicating location informationaccessed from the mobile device and/or other electronic device. In stillother implementations, the app or application may not be an app orapplication that person uses but may instead be an app or applicationthat monitors another app or application that the person does use andthe monitoring app or application may notify the electronic device basedthereon. Various configurations are possible and contemplated withoutdeparting from the scope of the present disclosure.

In various examples, this example method 1300 may be implemented using agroup of interrelated software modules or components that performvarious functions discussed herein. These software modules or componentsmay be executed within a cloud network and/or by one or more computingdevices, such as the server 1201 of FIG. 12 .

Although the example method 1300 is illustrated and described asincluding particular operations performed in a particular order, it isunderstood that this is an example. In various implementations, variousorders of the same, similar, and/or different operations may beperformed without departing from the scope of the present disclosure.

For example, the operation 1310 is illustrated and described as theelectronic device receiving notification of use of one or more apps orapplications executing on one or more mobile devices and/or otherelectronic devices. However, it is understood that this is an example.In other implementations, the electronic device may instead receivelocation information for on one or more mobile devices and/or otherelectronic devices, such as from one or more apps or applicationsexecuting on the one or more mobile devices and/or other electronicdevices. Various configurations are possible and contemplated withoutdeparting from the scope of the present disclosure.

In various implementations, a system for biometric gallery managementusing wireless identifiers may include a server and a station. Theserver may be operable to receive a wireless identifier at a first time,receive a digital representation of a first biometric, and store anassociation between the wireless identifier and the digitalrepresentation of the first biometric in a storage medium. The stationmay be operable to receive the wireless identifier at a second time,communicate the wireless identifier to the server, load the digitalrepresentation of the first biometric into a local gallery based on aresponse from the server, and perform a biometric identification bycomparing a digital representation of a second biometric to the digitalrepresentation of the first biometric stored in the local gallery.

In some examples, the server may be further operable to anonymize thewireless identifier in the association by hashing the wirelessidentifier. In a number of examples, the server may be further operableto receive a request to remove the wireless identifier and remove theassociation and the wireless identifier from the storage medium inresponse to the request. In various examples, the server may be furtheroperable to receive a request to remove the association and remove theassociation from the storage medium in response to the request.

In a number of examples, the server may be further operable to determinethat the wireless identifier is included in multiple associations andremove at least one of the multiple associations from the storagemedium. In some examples, the server may be further operable todetermine that the wireless identifier is unassociated with a thresholdnumber of subsequent identifications is not subsequently received withina threshold amount of time and, in response to determining that thewireless identifier is unassociated with the threshold number ofsubsequent identifications is not subsequently received within athreshold amount of time, remove the association from the storagemedium. In various examples, the server may be further operable toreceive a notification related to information in an app or applicationexecuting on an electronic device related to an activity performed by aperson and instruct the station to load a digital representation of athird biometric associated with the person into the local gallery inresponse to the notification.

In some implementations, a system for biometric gallery management usingwireless identifiers may include a communication unit operable toreceive a wireless identifier, a biometric reader device operable togenerate a digital representation of a biometric, a non-transitorystorage medium that stores instructions, and a processor. The processormay be operable to execute the instructions to receive at least onestored digital representation of a biometric to load into a localgallery from a server in response to communicating the wirelessidentifier and perform a biometric identification by comparing thedigital representation of the biometric to the at least one storeddigital representation of the biometric in the local gallery.

In various examples, the wireless identifier may be a first wirelessidentifier, the digital representation of the biometric may be a digitalrepresentation of a first biometric, and the processor may be furtheroperable to receive a second wireless identifier, receive a digitalrepresentation of a second biometric, and request that the serverassociate the second wireless identifier with the digital representationof the second biometric. In some such examples, the processor mayrequest that the server associate the second wireless identifier withthe digital representation of the second biometric when the digitalrepresentation of the second biometric is received within a thresholdamount of time of when the second wireless identifier is received. In anumber of such examples, the processor may communicate with a mobiledevice via the communication unit using the second wireless identifier.In various such examples, the processor may receive a confirmation fromthe mobile device to associate the second wireless identifier with thedigital representation of the second biometric.

In some examples, the processor may be further operable to transmit thedigital representation of the biometric to the server if the biometricidentification using the local gallery fails.

In a number of implementations, a system for biometric gallerymanagement using wireless identifiers may include a memory allocationconfigured to store at least one executable asset and a processorallocation configured to access the memory allocation and execute the atleast one executable asset to instantiate a gallery management serviceand a biometric identification service. The gallery management servicemay be operable to receive a wireless identifier at a first time,receive a digital representation of a first biometric, store anassociation between the wireless identifier and the digitalrepresentation of the first biometric in a storage medium, and load thedigital representation of the first biometric into a gallery in responseto receiving the wireless identifier at a second time. The biometricidentification service may be operable to perform a biometricidentification by comparing a digital representation of a secondbiometric to the digital representation of the first biometric stored inthe gallery.

In various examples, the gallery management service may receive thewireless identifier from an associated application executing on a mobiledevice associated with the wireless identifier. In some examples, thesystem may further include a wireless beacon and the gallery managementservice may receive the wireless identifier from a mobile device afterthe mobile device receives a signal from the wireless beacon. In anumber of examples, the gallery management service may be furtheroperable to determine that the wireless identifier is associated withmultiple identities and disassociate the wireless identifier from anidentity of the multiple identities that has the fewest associationswith the wireless identifier. In various examples, the wirelessidentifier may be a first wireless identifier, the digitalrepresentation of the biometric may be a digital representation of afirst biometric, and the gallery management service may be furtheroperable to receive a second wireless identifier, receive informationspecifying an identity that is associated with a digital representationof a second biometric, and associate the second wireless identifier withthe digital representation of the second biometric. In some suchexamples, the gallery management service may receive the second wirelessidentifier and the information from a mobile device associated with thesecond wireless identifier.

In a number of examples, the wireless identifier may be a first wirelessidentifier and the gallery management service may be further operable todetermine that the wireless identifier is not subsequently received andthat a second wireless identifier is associated with the digitalrepresentation of the biometric and remove the association.

Although the above illustrates and describes a number of embodiments, itis understood that these are examples. In various implementations,various techniques of individual embodiments may be combined withoutdeparting from the scope of the present disclosure.

As described above and illustrated in the accompanying figures, thepresent disclosure relates to biometric gallery management usingwireless identifiers. One or more wireless identifiers that correspondto one or more mobile devices (such as smart phones, tablet computingdevices, cellular telephones, wearable devices, smart watches, fitnessmonitors, digital media players, medical devices, and/or other mobilecomputing devices) that people carry may be associated with digitalrepresentations of biometrics corresponding to the people. Wirelessidentifiers corresponding to mobile devices proximate to a biometricreader device may be monitored. Upon detection of wireless identifierscorresponding to mobile devices proximate to the biometric readerdevice, the associated digital representations of biometrics may beloaded from a main gallery into one or more local galleries, which maythen be used to perform one or more biometric identifications and/orverifications. Associations between digital representations ofbiometrics and one or more wireless identifiers may be determined,stored, and/or updated using digital representations of biometrics fromone or more identifications and/or verifications and wirelessidentifiers corresponding to one or more mobile devices detectedproximate to one or more biometric reader devices.

The present disclosure recognizes that biometric and/or other personaldata is owned by the person from whom such biometric and/or otherpersonal data is derived. This data can be used to the benefit of thosepeople. For example, digital representations of biometrics may be usedto conveniently and reliably identify and/or authenticate the identityof people, access securely stored financial and/or other informationassociated with the digital representations of biometrics, and so on.This may allow people to avoid repeatedly providing physicalidentification and/or other information.

The present disclosure further recognizes that the entities who collect,analyze, store, and/or otherwise use such biometric and/or otherpersonal data should comply with well-established privacy policiesand/or privacy practices. Particularly, such entities should implementand consistently use privacy policies and practices that are generallyrecognized as meeting or exceeding industry or governmental requirementsfor maintaining security and privately maintaining biometric and/orother personal data, including the use of encryption and securitymethods that meets or exceeds industry or government standards. Forexample, biometric and/or other personal data should be collected forlegitimate and reasonable uses and not shared or sold outside of thoselegitimate uses. Further, such collection should occur only afterreceiving the informed consent. Additionally, such entities should takeany needed steps for safeguarding and securing access to such biometricand/or other personal data and ensuring that others with access to thebiometric and/or other personal data adhere to the same privacy policiesand practices. Further, such entities should certify their adherence towidely accepted privacy policies and practices by subjecting themselvesto appropriate third-party evaluation.

Additionally, the present disclosure recognizes that people may blockthe use of, storage of, and/or access to biometric and/or other personaldata. Entities who typically collect, analyze, store, and/or otherwiseuse such biometric and/or other personal data should implement andconsistently prevent any collection, analysis, storage, and/or other useof any biometric and/or other personal data blocked by the person fromwhom such biometric and/or other personal data is derived.

In the present disclosure, the methods disclosed may be implemented assets of instructions or software readable by a device. Further, it isunderstood that the specific order or hierarchy of steps in the methodsdisclosed are examples of sample approaches. In other embodiments, thespecific order or hierarchy of steps in the method can be rearrangedwhile remaining within the disclosed subject matter. The accompanyingmethod claims present elements of the various steps in a sample order,and are not necessarily meant to be limited to the specific order orhierarchy presented.

The described disclosure may be provided as a computer program product,or software, that may include a non-transitory machine-readable mediumhaving stored thereon instructions, which may be used to program acomputer system (or other electronic devices) to perform a processaccording to the present disclosure. A non-transitory machine-readablemedium includes any mechanism for storing information in a form (e.g.,software, processing application) readable by a machine (e.g., acomputer). The non-transitory machine-readable medium may take the formof, but is not limited to, a magnetic storage medium (e.g., floppydiskette, video cassette, and so on); optical storage medium (e.g.,CD-ROM); magneto-optical storage medium; read only memory (ROM); randomaccess memory (RAM); erasable programmable memory (e.g., EPROM andEEPROM); flash memory; and so on.

The foregoing description, for purposes of explanation, used specificnomenclature to provide a thorough understanding of the describedembodiments. However, it will be apparent to one skilled in the art thatthe specific details are not required in order to practice the describedembodiments. Thus, the foregoing descriptions of the specificembodiments described herein are presented for purposes of illustrationand description. They are not targeted to be exhaustive or to limit theembodiments to the precise forms disclosed. It will be apparent to oneof ordinary skill in the art that many modifications and variations arepossible in view of the above teachings.

What is claimed is:
 1. A system for biometric gallery management usingwireless identifiers, comprising: a server that is operable to: receivea wireless identifier at a first time; determine that a digitalrepresentation of a first biometric is received within a time thresholdor a proximity threshold of receipt of the wireless identifier; andstore an association between the wireless identifier and the digitalrepresentation of the first biometric in a storage medium upondetermining that the digital representation of the first biometric isreceived within the time threshold or the proximity threshold ofdetection of the wireless identifier; and a station that is operable to:receive the wireless identifier at a second time; communicate thewireless identifier to the server; load the digital representation ofthe first biometric into a local gallery based on a response from theserver related to the association between the wireless identifier andthe digital representation of the first biometric in the storage medium;perform a biometric identification by comparing a digital representationof a second biometric to the digital representation of the firstbiometric stored in the local gallery; receive a notification related toa check in for a flight, a hotel reservation, or a rental vehicleregistration performed by a person via an app or application executingon an electronic device; and instruct the station to load a digitalrepresentation of a third biometric associated with the person into thelocal gallery in response to the notification.
 2. The system of claim 1,wherein the server is further operable to: determine that the wirelessidentifier is associated with a different person than the digitalrepresentation of the first biometric; and remove the associationbetween the wireless identifier and the digital representation of thefirst biometric from the storage medium.
 3. The system of claim 1,wherein the server is further operable to remove at least one ofmultiple associations from the storage medium in response to determiningthat the wireless identifier is included in the multiple associations.4. The system of claim 1, wherein the electronic device is a mobiledevice.
 5. The system of claim 1, wherein the server is further operableto: determine that the association between the wireless identifier andthe digital representation of the first biometric is not subsequentlyconfirmed; and remove the association between the wireless identifierand the digital representation of the first biometric from the storagemedium.
 6. The system of claim 1, wherein the proximity threshold isless than 350 feet.
 7. The system of claim 1, wherein the time thresholdis less than a minute.
 8. A system for biometric gallery managementusing wireless identifiers, comprising: a biometric reader deviceoperable to generate a digital representation of a biometric; anon-transitory storage medium that stores instructions; and a processorthat is operable to execute the instructions to: receive at least onestored digital representation of a biometric to load into a localgallery from a server in response to communicating a wirelessidentifier, the at least one stored digital representation of thebiometric associated with the wireless identifier based on adetermination that the wireless identifier is detected within a timethreshold or a proximity threshold of capture of biometric dataassociated with the at least one stored digital representation of thebiometric; perform a biometric identification by comparing the digitalrepresentation of the biometric to the at least one stored digitalrepresentation of the biometric in the local gallery; wherein: thewireless identifier is a first wireless identifier; the digitalrepresentation of the biometric is a digital representation of a firstbiometric; and the processor is further operable to: receive a secondwireless identifier; receive a digital representation of a secondbiometric; request that the server associate the second wirelessidentifier with the digital representation of the second biometric upondetermining that the second wireless identifier is received within thetime threshold or the proximity threshold of receipt of the digitalrepresentation of the second biometric; and receives a confirmation froma mobile device to associate the second wireless identifier with thedigital representation of the second biometric.
 9. The system of claim8, further comprising transmitting a signal to the mobile device topresent an option to opt in to associating the second wirelessidentifier with the digital representation of the second biometric. 10.The system of claim 9, wherein the signal causes the mobile device tolaunch software that presents the option.
 11. The system of claim 8,wherein the wireless identifier comprises a WiFi wireless identifier.12. The system of claim 8, wherein the processor communicates thewireless identifier upon receiving the wireless identifier.
 13. Thesystem of claim 8, wherein the processor receives the wirelessidentifier via a wireless beacon.
 14. A computer program product,comprising: first instructions that are stored in a non-transitorystorage medium and executable by a processor to receive a wirelessidentifier at a first time; second instructions that are stored in thenon-transitory storage medium and executable by the processor to receivea digital representation of a biometric; third instructions that arestored in the non-transitory storage medium and executable by theprocessor to store an association between the wireless identifier andthe digital representation of the biometric in a storage medium upondetermining that the digital representation of the biometric is receivedwithin a time threshold or a proximity threshold of detection of thewireless identifier; fourth instructions that are stored in thenon-transitory storage medium and executable by the processor todisassociate the wireless identifier from an identity of multipledifferent identities that has fewest associations with the wirelessidentifier in response to determining that the wireless identifier isassociated with multiple different identities; and fifth instructionsthat are stored in the non-transitory storage medium and executable bythe processor to load the digital representation of the biometric into agallery in response to receiving the wireless identifier at a secondtime.
 15. The computer program product of claim 14, wherein the wirelessidentifier comprises a Bluetooth wireless identifier.
 16. The computerprogram product of claim 14, further comprising sixth instructions thatare stored in the non-transitory storage medium and executable by theprocessor to perform a biometric identification by comparing a digitalrepresentation of an additional biometric to the digital representationof the biometric stored in the gallery.
 17. The computer program productof claim 16, further comprising seventh instructions that are stored inthe non-transitory storage medium and executable by the processor totransmit the digital representation of the additional biometric to aserver upon failure of the biometric identification.
 18. The computerprogram product of claim 14, further comprising: sixth instructions thatare stored in the non-transitory storage medium and executable by theprocessor to receive a notification related to a check in for a flight,a hotel reservation, or a rental vehicle registration performed by aperson via an app or application executing on an electronic device; andseventh instructions that are stored in the non-transitory storagemedium and executable by the processor to load a digital representationof an additional biometric associated with the person into the galleryin response to the notification.
 19. The computer program product ofclaim 14, wherein the processor is remote from the gallery.
 20. Thecomputer program product of claim 14, wherein the wireless identifiercomprises a Near-field communication wireless identifier.